A Simple but Effective Way to Secure Your Online Wallet

If you have a loaded wallet on Blockchain, Coinbase, Green Address, Hive or on any other online wallet service, then you have every reason to worry about the safety your Bitcoins. This is because, at any time, there is someone looking for an opportunity to break in and wipe it clean.

Well, that could be an overstatement but it gives you an idea of the risk that is involved.

At least once in a while, such individuals succeed and often it is just by chance that it not your account they robbed.

But, you do not know when your turn will come. That is unless you find ways of making it difficult for them.

Of course, keeping your wallet offline is the ideal security measure every bitcoin user can take.

However, there are also practical reasons, such as convenience, that force you to have one on the Blockchain or other similar sites.

And this calls for a security approach within the online setting.

And there are many things you can do.

But for starters, take all the necessary safety measures the service provider has made available to you.

Do not ignore any.

Indeed, you will be surprised that often it is a simple setting that will prevent a couple-often it is everything-of your bitcoins from being stolen from your wallet.

Fortunately, most of these safety settings you have to undertake are no-brainer;require only a few clicks on your accounts security section and you are a huge step ahead.

And one such security settings, that you should never overlook at that section, is the multi-factor authentication option.

It is one of the best choices you have to secure your wallet.

But what is multi-factor authentication and how does it work?

Modern information technology offers three ways of authenticating your access: ‘What you know’ (Identifier and password or PIN), ‘What you are’ (fingerprints and eye scans) and ‘What you have’ (smart cards, ATM cards and mobile phones).

Using a combination of two or all three to gain access is what is known as the multi-factor authentication.

While using a single-factor authenticator like an identifier and password alone on your online wallet is fast and more convenient, it is the easiest obstacle a thief will face, in the bid to make your Bitcoins his-Yes, there are lady thieves too.

All he needs to do is to figure out the magic texts and numbers you use to unlock your wallet account.

And there are many ways to do that; from running combinations on special software, hacking to misleading you into giving them up.

However, with an extra layer of security the task becomes significantly harder or even impossible.

Virtually all online Bitcoin wallet service providers offer you one of the two extra layers of security and that is ‘what you have.’ It is not practical to employ ‘What you are,’ such as bio-metrics, for online identification, at least not for now.

You can implement the two-factor authenticator on your online wallet by going to your account settings, the security section. You will have to choose from SMS, email, key and Google authenticator.

Every time you will seek to access your wallet, you will have to receive a One-Time Password (OTP) through an SMS, email or Google authenticator.

You also have the option of buying a key that you will always input into a USB port to unlock your wallet.

With this measure, even if one got your identifier and the password, he cannot access the account unless he is in possession of your phone or key too.

Add while this security step will not eliminate the likelihood of you losing your Bitcoins from your wallet to criminals online entirely, it significantly enhances its security.